Chapter 20
CHAPTER TWENTY
Ball Room, Omega Hotel
When I walk into the decadent Christmas Eve Matching Ball, the party is already in full swing. Packs have been formed, Alphas have claimed scent matches, and high power political bonds between the richest families have been struck.
I hang back in the arched entrance to the marble and gilt ballroom, taking a steadying breath.
This is it.
After all the planning and dreaming, tonight will change everything in this golden barred cage one way or another.
I slide my hand down the silver silk dress that Piper made for me, which he paired with a tight pair of leather trousers. The dress hangs like a tunic over the trousers; it is parted to my thigh.
No one has bought me a gift like this before.
It’s a breath of fresh air in this stuffy world of demure Omegas.
It is the perfect Christmas gift like finally having a part of my soul seen and then accepted.
It fits with Piper’s punky outfit; it has slashes across the stomach and chains hanging down the sides.
Growing up, I would never have believed that an Omega could wear something like this.
Icarus firmly brushed my hair, pulling it down around my shoulders. “I’ve wanted to see it like this every day for years. Staff rules on hair have no place in my pack any longer.”
The dance floor is polished and gleams.
Guests wearing glittering ballroom dresses and designer black tie dance to the music, which is being played by the orchestra to the side of the stage not filled with a microphone and electric guitar ready for Zero’s performance.
The room’s marble columns have been decorated with branches to transform the entire space into a winter forest. A giant decorated fir tree towers over the stage.
The ballroom has been meticulously decorated by the staff in a nostalgic but glamorous style with garlands of holly and feathers around the arches.
My stomach clenches at the memory of how excited I would be when Dad brought me and my brothers to peer at the beautifully decorated ballroom, before the party each year.
I bet that neither Dad, Papa, nor Ellington will be allowed to attend tonight.
Perhaps, I’ll get lucky and I’ll even avoid Maya’s notice.
But that would be a Christmas miracle.
I avoid thinking about the matching ball when I was selected by the Alcotts.
I can’t deal with it right now.
The room’s high ceiling is vaulted, glowing with candle-like crystal chandeliers. Beta staff glide between the packs of laughing and chatting guests with silver platters of champagne flutes and canapes.
I nod to Lashonda, when she catches my eye.
She shoots me a secret smile, before ducking her head and weaving away amongst the guests.
“Okay, mio tesoro?” Lionzio asks.
He is standing at my shoulder, wearing a black tie suit with a silver waistcoat and chains looped between the buttons that make him look like a steampunk Bond.
I reach up to adjust his bow tie. “I couldn’t be better because I’m walking in on my Alpha’s arm.”
Lionzio looks surprised, before he glows.
He offers me his arm. “I never imagined that I would be able to publicly claim two Omegas like this.”
Then he offers his other arm to Piper.
Piper arches his pierced brow at me. “Ready to blow these Traditionals’ minds?”
I tilt up my chin. “Let’s do this.”
I focus on Icarus’ broad back. He looks amazing in black tie like I always knew he would. I have fantasized about him being dressed like this and accompanying me to a ball ever since I was a teenager.
Back then, I thought that it would just be as my friend.
Self-delusion is not my forte.
Neither is self-awareness.
Icarus has placed himself one step in front of the rest of us protectively. He is dressed in the same adapted suit as Lionzio is wearing.
I could tell how quietly pleased he was that he would match the other Alpha.
When he glances over his shoulder at me with a question in his eyes, I nod.
Because he is not merely asking if I am okay or ready to march into this matching ball and be claimed. But whether I am prepared for the complicated heist in less than ten minutes.
Under cover of brushing my hair and adjusting it earlier, Icarus also whispered, “The diaper bag is by the elevators.”
It would sound innocent to the rest of the pack.
Except, he means that it has been hidden there, probably by Ollie.
And it is no longer Zoe’s diaper bag but my safe cracking kit.
When Icarus reads the answer in my eyes, his lips curl up at the side.
Icarus faces the front again and leads his new pack (with a confidence that helps me to raise my own shoulders), into the ballroom.
Gasps and shocked whispers race, as if a hive of bees has suddenly been let loose, through the closest packs.
They part like we’ll infect them.
Piper slouches even more and swaggers like he was made for creating scandals.
Is it hot in here?
Sweat beads my forehead.
Lionzio squeezes my hand.
I blush but ignore the outrage and sneers. I’m not friends with these people. Some of them I know: I recognize several of the Omegas who used to hang around me for the status at school, tech billionaires who pretended to laugh at my jokes, even an actor Beta who sent me love letters.
Yet none of them helped me after the Alcotts abandoned me.
None of them contacted me, not once.
Only Icarus did.
He always has.
Now, they’re looking at me like I am worthless.
Fuck them.
They dare to come to this hotel, where my tormentor stepmom acts as host, and use Hotel Omegas…? I will find a way to investigate and expose every one of them.
Some of them shrink back now from the fierceness of my gaze.
My nerves have died down.
This is actually starting to be fun.
Until someone familiar steps out in front of Icarus, blocking his way.
My breath catches.
Logan.
The Alpha’s dark eyes are even colder than I remember.
Logan is dressed in a sharp but boring evening suit with a crisp white shirt that contrasts with his tanned skin and sleek black hair.
I expect to feel more than shock at seeing him after all this time. After all, this Alpha was the first to knot me. He gave me a courting ring. I thought that I would forever be bonded to him.
Yet all I feel is a mix of sadness and righteous rage for everything that he has put Zoe and me through.
But no loss.
No love.
My gaze slides to the Omega who is being hugged to his chest in a way that I never was. She is soft and gentle looking in a simple lace pink dress. Her neck is scarred with a bond mark.
Why did Logan never treat me like I was precious? Simply because I wasn’t his scent match?
I carried that like a weight around my neck for years. Yet Icarus isn’t my scent match and not once has he wavered in his devotion to me.
I used to have high walls, not allowing myself to trust in more than our friends with benefits arrangement because of my fear that one day, Icarus would leave me for his scent match.
Yet he has been surrounded by so many Omegas that I am certain by now he must have come across a scent match, but he hasn’t stopped loving me.
He hasn’t chosen them over me.
I no longer believe that an Alpha has to love only a scent match or that it’s inevitable an Omega will end up with their soulmate.
We are more than our biology.
We can be more than that.
I take a shakier hold on Lionzio’s hand, when I notice the swell of the other Omega’s stomach.
She’s pregnant.
It hits me harder than I thought it would. But not because I resent her. More because it’s real that Zoe will have a half sibling who she won’t know, when I love mine more than anything in the world.
“Grace,” John’s soft voice is infused with pain.
My gaze snaps up to the Beta who is standing behind Logan like he has been trained to.
John’s kind face is twisted with shame and regret.
And love.
I wish that I couldn’t see it in his large green eyes behind his glasses, as he pushes his cascade of brown hair out of his face in agitation.
Like usual, his suit is plain.
To Logan, Betas aren’t to be noticed.
My feelings for John are more complicated. They always were.
“Shut up, Beta,” Logan snarls.
For once, John ignores him. “I’m sorry, Grace. Hell, I’m just so sorry. I wasn’t allowed to contact you or—”
“Say one more word and see what happens.” Logan’s icy glare takes in our group.
““You look ridiculous. Is this another show like your Omega on the Shelf one? I enjoyed that. You,” he points at Icarus, “on the other hand, were an embarrassment having to be rescued by that whorish rock star. Stick to your strengths like running hotels but keep behind the scenes.”
“And what are your strengths?” Icarus’ eyes darken. “Abandoning promised bonds? Walking out on pregnant Omegas?”
The elites who are watching are shooting contemptuous glances not at me, rather at Logan.
This public scene is social suicide. As a newly qualified surgeon, Logan can’t afford this.
There are various ways to destroy an Alpha.
For someone like Logan who builds his entire identity on his ambition, career, and social standing, stripping them away from him is the best punishment.
He would rather I had killed him.
The female Omega gives a horrified squeak. She glances between Logan and me in alarm.
I feel like the earth is tipping and falling away under my feet.
Lionzio slips his arm around my waist to steady me to stop my knees from buckling.
It was all lies.
This female scent match Omega didn’t know: About me or my daughter.
She wasn’t the one who refused to accept me into the nest.
It was Logan.
The Alphahole.
The medical conference was in Houston. The female Omega isn’t local. She could have been kept away from the scandal.
Trust Logan that the temptation to match my younger brother and add to his status is enough for him to not care about his vaunted treasured Omega discovering the truth.
After all, he runs his pack with an iron-fist. How could she complain?
We’re gathering quite a crowd.
Logan appears uncomfortably aware of that fact as well.